Q&A and development image

by John
› March 17, 2015
23:17pm (EDT)

We recently had a new forum member ask some good questions about Ground Branch that I thought would be good to bring more attention to.

1. AI. What can we expect from AI performance? will friendly character’s instinctively dig corners, pick up security, not run in front of your muzzle, follow directions ect. And will the enemy act more like a live role player? Run and hide, spray and pray around corners, be distracted, investigate noise ect.

AI is still a bit out, but Epic is doing some really nice things with their built in AI solution. Its not just bots anymore.

We certainly plan to have our AI react as humanly possible given our resources and time though.

2. Weapons. Im assuming the selection will replicate a highly funded and completely supported special missions unit like the SOG, but what about the
details? examples, a BAD lever making your reloads quicker (because they do) suppresors NOT making “damage” lower (because they dont) sub sonic ammo making the report quieter but reducing velocity and perhaps accuracy at certain ranges ect.

We are not setting out to make a huge arsenal of weapons. Modders will take care of that for sure. We will have a pretty standard set covering Pistol/SubMachineGun/AssaultRifle/Shotgun/LightMachineGun/Sniper/Explosive

We don’t plan on including any “active” reload situations or random fouling sorts of things. Yes, that stuff does happen in real life, but we feel its just an annoyance in a a game and just frustrates people for no reason. Attachments will have actual impact on the weapons/ammo as well. They won’t be just for show.

3. Breaching. Please tell me work is going to one of the most vital areas in a direct action game. Will there be different charges to choose from and have the appropriate effect? Will it be an option giving tactical leverage to the assault force, or just an amenity to add to the look which apparently RS siege has done.

We are planning on having extensive breaching capabilities for doorway entry…. including breaching shotguns, charges, kicking and other. We have even prototyped a way to allow players to block doorways from being breached. Not sure if that will make it in or not.

What we probably won’t have much of is arbitrary wall breaching and things like that. That isn’t an area we have the resources to tackle.

4. mission planning. Will we be able to plan the assault? and if so how detailed?

Mission Planning is up in the air at the moment. For CoOp, the plan is to have a pre-mission planning phase where live players can work out their “x’s and o’s” together, but planning for SP a’la Rainbow Six may be out of the scope of GB for now.

5. Sound. Different sounds for shooting indoors and outside? a small thing but would make a noticeable difference to the authentic feel im sure you would agree.

I’m not sure if we will have the budget to record different sounds, but we definitely have environmental settings that process sound based on indoor/outdoor. It all depends on how much funding we can get.

6. Tactics. Goes along with AI but is there a realistic approach or a “user friendly” action oriented approach. A better way to word this I guess would be. Are you going to feel like your conducting an actual raid, or just run and gunning at a slower pace becasue you go down in one hit? I hope that question makes sense

I guess that’s up to you and how you play I think. Ground Branch is not designed as a run ‘n gun game simply by the shoot/move mechanics and the way weapons work. We aren’t a sim though so we strive to make things as streamlined as possible. We don’t want you thinking about controls and key combos during play.

7. Maps. I think I already know assuming, but are we going to see some diversity. This is representing a unit that has no operational area, because its on a global scale. Can we expect to see this in the maps we play? As well as the likely CQB settings of houses, offices, industrial areas, schools and public places?

Yes there will be plenty of diversity. There will be locations all over the world…. think R6 in this respect.

And now some art.

We have a few art assets that has been around for a while, so I thought it a good time to start updating some things. Ground Branch will have frag, smoke and flashbang grenades…. even with various colors of smoke.